Can Biden's plans manufacture more US factory jobs?

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden will be trying to connect with blue-collar workers Wednesday when he travels to a truck factory in Pennsylvania to advocate for government investments and clean energy as ways to strengthen U.S. manufacturing.

The president will tour the Lehigh Valley operations facility for Mack Trucks, a chance to touch base with the plant's 2,500 workers, a majority of whom are unionized. Biden has made manufacturing jobs a priority, and Democrats’ political future next year might hinge on whether he succeeds in reinvigorating a sector that has steadily lost jobs for more than four decades.

The administration is championing a $973 billion infrastructure package, $52 billion for computer chip production, sweeping investments in clean energy and the use of government procurement contracts to create factory jobs. Biden will be briefed Wednesday on Mack's electric garbage trucks.

“This is all part of his effort to lift up and talk about his Buy American agenda as well as the infrastructure package,” White House press secretary Jen Psaki said Tuesday in previewing the visit.

The president won Lehigh County in the 2020 election, but he is facing the perpetual challenge of past administrations to revive a manufacturing sector at the heart of American identity. Failure to bring back manufacturing jobs could further hurt already ailing factory towns across the country and possibly imperil Democrats' chances in the 2022 midterm elections.

Pennsylvania Sen. Pat Toomey, a Republican, said Biden should siphon off unspent money from his $1.9 trillion coronavirus relief package to cover the investments in infrastructure, instead of relying on tax increases and other revenue raisers to do so.

“Hopefully, he will use his visit to learn about the real, physical...